


human

by starstrong



Category: Be More Chill - Iconis/Tracz, Be More Chill - Ned Vizinni
Genre: Coming Out, M/M, No Relationship, Trans Character, friendship instead, im aroace fight me, trans!jeremy, unintentional deadname, why have relationships when you can have friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-06
Updated: 2018-01-06
Packaged: 2019-03-01 00:08:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,218
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13282755
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starstrong/pseuds/starstrong
Summary: Michael's character sheets would not come in handy here. Even his level twenty, definitely played to get there, wizard could not save the day.





	human

To Michael, Jeremiah Cohen was a mystery. They met freshman year. Jeremy was that dorky new kid in school, acne and all. He saw Michael sitting alone at lunch the first day of school and sat with him. It was a week before they spoke to each other but, to Michael, he felt like he had known Jeremy for years. Except, they both know that they had not.

If anything, it was a little creepy. More so was the thought that even after three years of friendship, Jeremy would never let Michael go to his house, drive him home, meet his parents, etc. He told stories of his past but never did they seem real.

After three years, Michael was convinced that Jeremy Cohen was a demon in disguise of a miracle. He was even convinced that it had to do something with his own childhood friend going missing. The summer between eighth grade, Emily Heere dropped off the planet.

Michael did not understand this until well into their junior year. At first, he was convinced that Jeremy was just some doppelganger that had stolen his best friend’s skin. The idea only got planted into his head more when Jeremy was absent, a rare thing, and a substitute was in one of their classes.

“Jeremiah?”

Michael opened his mouth to explain that Jeremy was absent for a doctor’s appointment only to be stopped.

“Jeremiah Heere?”

Heere.

And the flower had planted its roots in Michael’s head as the name Jeremiah Heere ringed in his eyes everytime Jeremy spoke, looked at him, texted him, so on. God, even the teachers were in on it! He still signed his name as Jeremy Cohen on every paper.

What made it worse was the day Michael decided to visit the original Heere’s residence. Armed with his knowledge of D&D doppelganger statistics from all editions, he knocked on the front door and muttered a prayer under his breath. Could God save him now from death by a fantasy roleplaying creature? Or was he supposed to expect that on his life insurance?

“Hello?”

There he was, not the enigma himself, but Paul Heere. They kept eye contact for seconds before he cleared his throat and Michael looked away in fear. He should not be afraid, he used to know this man. This man used to be his second father.

“Hey, Mister Heere?”

As much as Michael was convinced he was being as chill and undercover as possible for a nerd with D&D Monster Manuals in his backpack, he did not appreciate his voice cracking and how his statement turned into a question. God, he felt like he was in that one episode of Stranger Things with his books. Emily would have loved that show.

“Michael?”

Fuck. Mission Failed. His cover was blown.

“That’s me.”

“What are you doing here?” He paused. “It’s been years.”

“I came to finally check on Emily.”

“An Emily has never lived here.”

Oh, fuck! The flower was growing into many, many buds. Was Paul also in on it? Were they both doppelgangers? His character sheets would not come in handy here. Even his level twenty, definitely played to get there, wizard could not save the day.

“A-Are you sure?” Michael asked, staring up at the man and then into the house through the window.

Paul cleared his throat to get Michael’s attention again. “Yes.”

“But, how do you know my name? O-Or-”

“Because you’re best friends with my son.”

At this moment, the flower went from red to blue. Suddenly the Monster Manuals were no use to him. No longer were they doppelgangers but Michael was now convinced that at some point his universe crossed with another by some accident and now some of the world has changed and he was the only one who knew. Not that complicated in theory but very complicated in practice.

Of course, there was also the idea that some aliens crash landed on Earth and took the personas of the Heere’s and got Emily wrong somewhere in the mix. You know, doppelgangers but alien based right? Doppelganger aliens from Mars. Also Doppelganger aliens possibly from Kepler-22b. They must have really wanted to eat and take over his friend and her dad.

“Who is your son?”

“Dad, who are you talking-”

Jeremy stood at the top of the stairs, making eye contact with Michael and stopping where he was. Three seconds was the only time Michael was given before Jeremy broke it and looked to his dad. A look of betrayal he knew too much. Now that he saw it, he started to realize how similar Emily and Jeremy look like.

“Do you want to come inside?” Paul asked quietly, glancing up to Jeremy then Michael.

It took him a few seconds before Michael nodded.

He was led inside and sat down in living room. He took his favorite spots from years before, cold from his absence. The house was the same as he remembered it as far as his memory went back. The only exception was that all the pictures of Emily were gone and most replaced by ones of Jeremy.

Jeremy sat next to him but ‘next to’ was a loose term. He was sat on the other end of the couch. His dad was on the couch across from them. The coffee table between them was there but it felt more like a million oceans. Michael could be on Earth with Jeremy and Jeremy’s dad could be on Kepler-22b. Or Mars, possibly.

“So,” Jeremy’s dad breathed out, “Michael.”

“That’s my name.”

“Dad, I think I should be the one to tell him.” Jeremy’s voice was quiet. He calculated every word he said and more just like usual. Emily did that too.

“You had three years!”

“You can’t be angry over this when it was my decision!”

Michael broke them up before they fought more. “Is your name even Jeremiah Cohen?”

“Cohen?” Paul watched his son in awe. “You lied to him about your last name?”

“I didn’t know what to expect from his reaction if I showed up day one saying my name was Jeremy Heere, yes the same Heere that he used to know! ‘Oh, by the way, I am that person but please refer to me as Jeremy and he/him pronouns now?’”

“I’m right here.” Michael muttered out. He looked up from his lap and to Jeremy. “You could have told me.”

“Well I didn’t.”

“Why?”

“I was scared,” Jeremy gulped, “Of how you would react.”

Michael took a deep breath.

His best friend of thirteen years was not a doppelganger nor alien nor doppelganger alien, he was a human being. A human being who was following his own path and figuring out who he was. He was a human being looking for support.

Michael knew that feeling. No matter how many D&D books he searched through, you could never find advice on how to be a teenager in New Jersey who was a gay male. Hell, you couldn’t find that in parenting books no matter how hard his mother and father looked.

His best friend was trans. That did not dare to define him. He was a human being and so was, hopefully, everyone else on the planet.

“No need to be scared anymore.”


End file.
